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Category: Ancient Weapons

During the medieval days when weapons and war were plentiful, there was a large weapon that was invented much like the catapult. This weapon had more of a dramatic impact than any other weapon during that time – it was called the trabuco.

Although it was similar to a catapult, it was more destructive since it allowed its projectile items to go farther and hit its intended target with a stronger force.

There were two types of trabucos – traction trabucos and counterweight trabucos. The traction trabuco was designed like a regular catapult but used human strength for its power according to priberam.pt. People would hold ropes on one side then let the ropes go when it was time to fling objects towards their target. The more commonly known trabuco – the counterweight trabuco – used the weight of a full box on one side to fling objects. Many times the box would be filled with rocks and stones to help weight it down. It would then sling its items by using the energy that was kept as a counterweight. As aforementioned, this allowed it to catapult its objects farther than any other regular catapult. As a result, thicker walls and larger moats had to be built to be able to withstand, and deter, the trabuco’s force. The trabuco quickly became the weapon of choice during medieval sieges and wars.

In addition to the trabuco’s benefits during the medieval times, today it is used to help teachers teach physics. The physics of the trabuco show how potential energy can be converted into kinetic energy.

On wordreference.com, the trabuco had one way of working but many different versions were made by different regions, such as China, Brazil, and the French, among others.

Even though we use modern weapons nowadays, the significance and impact that the trabuco had during medieval times has forever changed the way we look at physics, and the amazing effectiveness of the trabuco.